Preparation for April's poetry class. Section 2

Preparation for April's poetry class.

Open with The Jewel
The Jewel by James Wright

Story, via Molly Peacock, of the Talisman poem. The prelinguistic state, understanding so profound we are returned to a prelinguistic state

I have no idea what poetry is. I have no idea what life is, if there is a meaning, what god is. In poetry we try to approximate something, we make up rules like those for children’s games.

Explaining the unexplainable – what is life - (religion and philosophy – big issues), poetry as magic, ritual deriving from the first religious ceremomies, grounded in spirituality, knowing the unknown. (prayers) – spirit (ual) – ritual – chant (something between speaking and singing – song – Logos – thread - Gauguin "Where do we come from? What are we? Where are we going?

What is poetry? *** Read entry in Hirsch for POETRYCriticism *** Poetry is a constant reformulation of the question, not giving the answer - Another language, an emotional language? Instinctual, non-rational. It is wisdom we want from poetry. (peacock). Point of a story is the telling, a poem points to realization (often epiphany).

Poetry is not factual, logical, but experiential, emotional. A poem is an experience and not the description of an experience (interaction of the reader and the poem – is there a poem without a reader?)


the story of Dr. Scanlon. Didn't know much about what I wanted to do,knew what I didn't want to do (the war).You can say anything in this class about any poem, the caveat being that it bebased on something in the poem, something you can point to and say,"This is why I mean that."

Personal experience – Diane Wakoski Dancing on the Grave of a Son of a Bitch

Reading poetry everyday …The only other rule is to allow others their opinions. We can disagree,just not belittle.

Criticism - like pulling off the wings of butterfly to find beauty.

Enjoyment over analysis -

How does a poem mean – sense does not come first, sometime sound or feeling (like music) – Read first for the music (visceral) not the sense (intellectual) - appealing to the instinctive, the intuitive

Therefore, what we'll be doing today will be poetry appreciation not poetry analysis

The one thing missing is history (survey), which is important, but cannot be covered in one session. However I’ve deliberately selected some poems that have strong relationships to each that might suggest an historical connectionanalysis.

Few basics based on Molly Peacock: (3 systems of a poem)1) The line 2) The sentence 3) The image (imagery is the central nervous system of the poem) Add the approach in Poetry for Students

"When we attain the state of not knowing, that becomes the only knowledge we have." peacock
Words – nouns (imagery is largely built on nouns – places and ideas) - verbs (action) – adjectives, adverbs (emotional ambience – tone)Importance of punctuation in rhythm, hence sense.

Rhythm, the weight of line endings. Who is speaking to whom.Who is speaking to whom?

Never assume "I" is the poet.

Specifically choosing some poems because of their popularity – Angelou, Joseph, Auden